November 7, 1913] 



SCIENCE 



663 



ingly illustrated by its very recent develop- 

 ment in special industries. It has been 

 said that our best research is carried on in 

 those laboratories which have one client, 

 and that one themselves. 



Twenty-five years ago the number of in- 

 dustrial concerns employing even a single 

 chemist was very small, and even he was 

 usually engaged almost wholly upon rou- 

 tine work. Many concerns engaged in 

 business of a distinctly chemical nature had 

 no chemist at all, and such a thing as in- 

 dustrial research in any proper sense hardly 

 came within the field of vision of our manu- 

 facturers. Many of them have not yet 

 emerged from the penumbra of that eclipse 

 and our industrial foremen, as a class, are 

 still within the deeper shadow. Meantime, 

 however, research has firmly established 

 itself among the foundation stones of our 

 industrial system, and the question is no 

 longer "What will become of the chem- 

 ists?" It is now, "What will become of 

 the manufacturers without them?" 



In the United States to-day, the micro- 

 scope is in daily use in the examination of 

 metals and alloys in more than 200 labora- 

 tories of large industrial concerns. 



An indeterminate but very great amount 

 of segregated research is constantly carried 

 forward in small laboratories which are 

 either an element in some industrial organ- 

 ization or under individual control. An ex- 

 cellent example of the quality of work to be 

 credited to the former is found in the de- 

 velopment of cellulose acetate by Mork in 

 the laboratory of the Chemical Products 

 Company, while a classic instance of what 

 may be accomplished by an aggressive indi- 

 vidualism plus genius in research is fa- 

 miliar to most of you through the myriad 

 and protean applications of bakelite. The 

 rapidity of the reduction to practise of 

 Baekeland's research results is the more 

 amazing when one considers that the dis- 



tances to be traveled between the labora- 

 tory and the plant are often, in case of 

 new processes and products, of almost as- 

 tronomical dimensions. 



Reference has already been made to the 

 highly organized, munificently equipped 

 and splendidly manned laboratories of the 

 du Pont Company, the General Electric 

 Company and the Eastman Kodak Com- 

 pany. There are in the country at least 

 fifty other notable laboratories engaged in 

 industrial research in special industries. 

 The expenditure of several of them is over 

 $300,000 each a year; the United States 

 Steel Corporation has not hesitated to spend 

 that amount upon a single research; the 

 expenses of a dozen or more probably ex- 

 ceed $100,000 annually. The limits of any 

 address delivered outside a jail unfortu- 

 nately preclude more than the merest refer- 

 ence to a very few. One of the finest iron 

 research laboratories in the world is that 

 of the American Rolling Mills Co. Equally 

 deserving mention from one aspect or 

 another are the laboratories of the Fire 

 Underwriters, the National Carbon Co., the 

 Solvay Process Co., the General Bakelite 

 Co., Parke, Davis & Co., the Berlin Mills 

 Co., the United Gas Improvement Co., the 

 National Electric Lamp Association, Swift 

 & Co., the Pennsylvania Railroad and many 

 others. 



Research in the textile industries has 

 been greatly stimulated by the various tex- 

 tile schools throughout the country, of 

 which the Lowell Textile School with its 

 superb equipment is perhaps best known. 

 The fermentation industries have been 

 brought upon a scientific basis largely 

 through the efforts of the Wahl-Henius In- 

 stitute at Chicago and other special schools. 

 In the paper industry, general research is 

 mainly confined to the Forest Products 

 Laboratory at Madison, its branch labora- 

 tory for wood pulp at Wausau, the Bureau 



